Last year, we teamed up with Guinness to create a summer barbecue recipe using their new Blonde American Lager, and it must have been a success, because we were invited to participate again this year, albeit with a different beer as inspiration.

Guinness Nitro IPA is everything you’d want from an English-style IPA balanced with everything you’d expect from Guinness. Using a groundbreaking nitrogenation device that creates the same surge and settle effect of draft beer in a can, this India Pale Ale is comprised of a complex blend of hops and roasted barley with citrus accents. It’s smooth, creamy and rich with a pleasant bitter finish.

They say that blondes have more fun, and we were given a chance to test that theory when Guinness sent over some samples of the latest addition to their beer family – Guinness Blonde American Lager – and challenged us to come up with the best summer barbeque dish to pair alongside it. After taking just a few sips of the crisp, savory beer, which “blends floral and citrus notes with a unique biscuit malt flavor,” we quickly realized that, unlike their heavier stouts, this would go well with just about any summertime dish.

So we decided to keep it simple and make a classic burger-and-fries combo, because Guinness Blonde – which is produced in Latrobe, Pennsylvania – is described as an American lager, and what’s more American than that? It’s something that anyone with a grill and basic cooking skills can make, and it tastes even better with gourmet burgers from Omaha Steaks, who graciously provided the meat for the challenge.

Granted, our finished dish probably won’t be winning any awards for originality, but we tried to get a little creative with our all-beef burger, which was topped with Guinness Blonde-infused BBQ sauce (yeah, we went there), Vermont sharp white cheddar cheese and crispy onion straws on a brioche bun. We paired our BBQ burger with grilled corn on the cob, roasted red potatoes and, of course, a bottle of Guinness Blonde American Lager, and it was every bit as delicious as it looks in the picture below.

A photo posted by Bullz-Eye.com (@bullzeyedotcom) on Jul 7, 2015 at 11:14am PDT

For more about Guinness Blonde American Lager, be sure to follow Guinness on Twitter at @GuinnessUS and use #BlondeBBQChallenge to show off your own food pairings. And for other Guinness-inspired dish ideas, check out GuinnessHooley.com.

When the folks at Guinness invited us to join them in Ann Arbor, Michigan for the weekend to drink some beer and watch Manchester United and Real Madrid battle it out at The Big House, we couldn’t decline. After all, how often do you get the opportunity to see two of the biggest soccer clubs in the world compete live, let alone on U.S. soil? For most people, it’s a once in a lifetime experience, and with United absent from this year’s UEFA Champions League, the chances that fans will ever see Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo share the stage again seems pretty unlikely.

So as the resident soccer fan on staff, I flew out to Detroit on Friday to meet up with fellow bloggers from sites like Made Man, Bleacher Report, Inside Hook and World Soccer Talk. After quickly checking into my room at the MGM Grand Hotel, I joined the rest of the group as we boarded a van headed for the home of the Michigan Wolverines to watch Manchester United and Real Madrid’s open training sessions. Both teams appeared to be relaxed but focused on the night leading up to the big game, engaging in the usual fitness drills and rounds of keep-away, while a few of the players even tried their hand at some football of the American variety by tossing the pigskin around with University of Michigan quarterback Devin Gardner.

Of course, it was all just a tease for the real festivities on Saturday, which began with miles of traffic on I-94 as tens of thousands of soccer fans flooded the college town of Ann Arbor for the big game. Thanks to some creative detouring by our driver, we arrived in plenty of time to enjoy a cold pint at the Guinness beer garden, who, as the main sponsors of the International Champions Cup, were allowed to serve alcohol inside the usually “dry” stadium, a rarity for the university and college sports in general.

Earlier today, the Guinness Storehouse (the Guinness brewery in Dublin, Ireland) rolled out the red carpet to welcome one of the world’s most famous actors in history, Tom Cruise. Cruise jetted into Dublin as part his worldwide tour for his latest movie, “Oblivion,” accompanied by director Joseph Kosinski and Cruise’s leading, lady former Bond girl Olga Kurylenko.

The group was treated to a private tour of the Guinness Brewery, and Tom received a one-on-one session with Master Brewer Fergal Murray to learn how to pour the perfect pint of Guinness.

Since opening its doors in 2000, the Guinness Storehouse has welcomed over 9 million visitors from around the world and is Ireland’s number one international visitor attraction. The building, a former fermentation plant in the legendary St. James’s Gate Brewery in Dublin, holds a seven story Guinness experience which allows visitors to gain an understanding of why Guinness has become one of the world’s most iconic and best loved brands.

Guinness gave a simulated tour of its famed St. James’ Gate Brewery at the Altman Building in New York City last night. Though the actual brewery is, of course, in Dublin, the Guinness folks provided a virtual tour via video screens, and talked the audience through a brief history of the company. Founded in 1759 by Arthur Guinness, who signed a 9,000 year lease at St. James’ Gate, Guinness is now watched over by master brewer Fergal Murray, who is in charge of making sure the dark, creamy beer maintains its consistent texture and flavor. One of the most interesting things I learned was that the famed harp logo associated with Guinness also happens to be the logo of the Irish government. If the harp is facing right, it’s Guinness; if left, it’s the government.

According to the official slogan, it takes exactly 119.5 seconds to pour a perfect pint of Guinness; that half a second is allegedly the difference between a good pint and a perfect one. After being given a perfect (and, more importantly, free) pint upon entering the event, an announcement was made that “our show will begin in 119.5 seconds,” at which point a countdown began. Charismatic comedian Dan Soder then appeared onstage to give us some background on the classic Guinness draught we had just imbibed, which is nitrogenated, a process that sets it apart from other beers and gives it that unique, smooth texture. He also gave us some helpful hints on how to mix Guinness with other beers made by the same company, such as Harp Lager and Smithwick’s Ale: Guinness mixed with Smithwick’s is a “blacksmith,” while Guinness mixed with Harp is a “half and half.”

We then proceeded to try mini-pints of a few special brews developed by Guinness. First up was the Foreign Extra Stout, a tasty brew with slightly more bite to it than the classic Guinness and also a bit more sweetness, giving it a flavor similar to very dark chocolate. The Foreign Extra Stout contains more hops and more alcohol (7.5% ABV) than any other Guinness brew, because it was originally developed to be shipped long distances overseas, and alcohol and hops both act as preservatives. The last beer we sampled was Guinness Black Lager, which was my personal favorite of the three. It is cold brewed with roasted barley, giving it a crisp, clean taste that is lighter and more refreshing than the standard thick, creamy finish of the brew for which Guinness is best known. Though not as strong as the Foreign Extra Stout, it is definitely a better summer beer, and one that I will likely sample again in the coming months.